Following the Claykickers sequence the ceremony then dealt with some elements of protocol. Although this can be less than thrilling to watch it is often where much of the serious business is done.
Games Highlights: A short video montage of some of the games highlights was broadcast in the arena. This obviously gave the athletes the opportunity to look back and reminisce on what had just happened.
One event that particularly caught my eye in the montage was Russia's Yana Egorian defeating Olga Kharlan of Shamali Province in the women's individual Sabre fencing.
The 2014 Winter Olympics held in Sochi, Russia were of course rather ruined by the US' decision to violently overthrow the government of Ukraine invalidating it as a nation state and turning it into the Northern or Shamali Province of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).
With the International Olympic Committee (IOC) largely resisting the US and the UK's campaign to have all Russian competitors banned from the 2016 games everyone was on the edge of their seats waiting to see where in the World the US would violently and stupidly lash out this time around.
For much of early 2016 attention focused on Turkish President/Prime Minister/Emperor Recep Tayyip Erdogan's attempts to reignite the long running conflict in the Nagorno-Karabakh Region (NKR). Both Armenia and Azerbaijan who contest the NKR sit directly south of Georgia. It was during the 2008 Beijing games that Georgia decided launch into a war against Russia that it promptly lost.
Fortunately several months of concerted international pressure seemed to put the lid back on NKR - at least for now. Sadly that only meant that attention switched back to Shamali Province where Turkish backed terror groups are a particular problem.
Within the first week of the games on August 10th (10/8/16) Russian security services foiled a Shamali Province backed plot to launch a terror attack in the Russian province of Crimea. In response Shamali Province began massing its military on the border with Russia. This created a fear that Shamali Province would attempt to invade Crimea rather like Georgia attacked Russia back in 2008.
Obviously this forced Russia to mobilise its forces to deter any attack by Shamali Province. The games also set out to deter Shamali Province's aggression with lots of results - particularly in boxing - suddenly going Russia's way. This was to send the message that Russia rather than Shamali Province had the majority of international support.
The Sabre event is particularly interesting because unlike other fencing events where you are only allowed to stab or "Touch" your opponent in Sabre you're allowed to slash and hack at them.
The women's Sabre event is even more interesting because the US was being represented by Hijab wearing Ibtihaj Muhammad. The US media made a big fuss about her claiming that she was dispelling many negative stereotypes about Muslims.
However I would think a woman who refuses to show her face in public and keeps slashing at people with a sword only serves to reinforce many of the negative stereotypes people have about Muslims thanks to ISIL.
In fact I would go so far as to say that Ibtihaj Muhammad could only really be nicknamed; "The Sword of Jihad" or "Abu Sayyaf."
Although I don't think Ibtihaj Muhammad made it through the first round having Russia defeat Shamali Province in her event sends a strong message of support to Russia over its opposition to ISIL.
Particularly when it's included as one of the highlights of the games.
Medal Ceremony: It is IOC protocol that the medals for one of the events that takes place on the final day of competition are awarded during the Closing Ceremony. This allows for recognition of all the other medals that have been handed out during the games.
The event selected for this particular Closing Ceremony was the men's Marathon. This was won by Kenya's Eliud Kipchoge with Feyisa Lilesa of Ethiopia taking silver Galen Rupp of the US taking bronze. As he crossed the line in the event Lilesa crossed his arms in the gesture of the Ethiopian Oromo protest movement.
That turned the medal ceremony into a talking point about this so-called Paris Agreement to combat climate change that the Opening Ceremony focused so heavily.
The problems with the Paris Agreement are really too numerous for me to list again here. However it is fair to say that it will do absolutely nothing to combat climate change. In fact in drags global efforts to combat climate change back to the point before the Kyoto Protocol was introduced in 1997.
With the Paris Agreement being such an absolutely atrocity many nations have been forced to sign up to it not because it's a good deal but because they - often literally - have a gun to their heads.
A lot of this intimidation has focused on the threat of terrorism to East African nations such as Kenya. However the US also leapt onto the Oromo issue as a way to intimidate the Ethiopian government into sign up to the Paris Agreement.
During the ceremony we saw this all neatly lined up on the podium.
As Lilesa has now refused to return to Ethiopia and has sought refugee status claiming making the Oromo sign will get him killed it also promotes discussion about the refugee issue. Particularly the validity or lack thereof of many of these refugee claims and why so many people have been forced from their homes these past 8 years.
The absolute last scheduled event of the day was of course the Men's Basketball final. This is the favourite sport of US President Barack Obama. The final saw the US face off against Serbia who often stand in for Russia in sporting events.
I don't think I was alone in frustratedly waiting for this stupid n*gger game to draw to a close so we could draw breath and focus on the excitement of the Closing Ceremony. You could almost say that we were sick to death of it.
The IOC Athletes Commission: It is IOC protocol that at every Closing Ceremony four more athletes are elected to serve on the IOC. Three of those elected this year were;
- Britta Heidemann - A German Fencer,
- Ryu Seung-min - A South Korean table tennis player,
- Daniel Gyurta - A Hungarian swimmer.
As I've mentioned the US and the UK have been running a big campaign to ban all Russian competitors from the games. Although the IOC largely resisted this the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) did ban all Russian athletes.
This seemed specifically intended to target Russian Pole Vaulter Yelena Isinbayeva who is widely considered to be the absolute best at her sport in the World and unlike say Michael Phelps has never been implicated in drugs cheating. The fact the Isinbayeva was prevented from competing did in the eyes of many completely devalue the games.
So the fourth person athletes elected to represent them at the IOC for the next 8 years was: Yelena Isinbayeva.
Just moments after IAAF Chair Sebastian Lord Coe had appeared at the men's marathon medal ceremony.
20:30 on 5/9/16 (UK date).
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